Sunday, August 26, 2012

It is hard to keep track of hundreds of horses.

After a few failed returned phone calls about Bay Girl, and after finally (FINALLY) making contact last week, I had my work cut out for me concerning finding information relevant to finding out exactly who Bay Girl was in enormous the recipient mare herd. I heard there are something like six hundred head of horses out on their property, so understandably they are numbered instead of named, and not well remembered by the staff. I was asked by the head vet to figure out the name off Elvis' owner, in order to figure out exactly which mare they had lent out to him, and I did so. A few MORE failed phone calls later, I finally got ahold of him, and passed on the owner's information. "Ok, let me look up the name.... ok, found it. Yep, so this is an A-brand mare, right? She has an A with her brand?" Ah.... no. No, she does not. "Oh... well that is the only name in here that matches that, so they must have the wrong mare and foal!" Ah... well no, I think it's the right one. "Well, let me ask my secretary if she can find the mare from the description you're giving me... the donor mare was not Marguerite du Por Favor, was it?" Ah... no, I don't remember the name but it was definitely not that. "Well, let me get back to you next week."Thankfully, less than a minute later, my phone rang again. "Hey, I found her! The donor mare is Go Mecham Gold, right?" Yes! Yes, that's the donor mare. "All right, well the recipient mare is tag number R95, so remember that." No problem... sure will. We spoke briefly about it, and agreed that I would call back again closer to weaning time in order to strike a deal. Now that it has been a few days, I think I am actually NOT going to wait until weaning time... they are so hard to get a hold of anyway that I risk missing my opportunity if I don't solidify it now. I'll be calling again this coming week and saying, look here mister... this is happening and I'll be there to sign the paperwork whenever you want!

Yesterday, Bay Girl, Zoie, and baby all took the opportunity to come trotting over to me for breakfast from understand their shed (it was *gasp!* drizzling outside and none of them wanted to be wet). It is hard to evaluate Bay Girl's movement without being able to do more than just catch her at random moments running in the pasture, but I have seen enough trotting and cantering to know that she possesses three phenomenal gaits. She absolutely blows Pangea out of the water in terms of gait quality (but don't tell her that!). Time will tell if she is on par with Gogo in the same terms, but from what I have seen, she is. That trot took my breath away - huge, sweeping, floating and fluidly sound. The only thing I can fault her on is that she has a very, very slight outward paddle to both fronts. There isn't any sort of weird conformation fault that adds to this, so I'm not worried. Once in awhile I will also catch her cantering off, or in full sprint mode, and let me tell you... that girl is FAST! Her canter is huge, uphill, and pure. Every time I see her move, all I can think about it how awesome she is going to be once under saddle. And every time I touch her, every time she lets me walk up and pet her face, I get chills and butterflies in my stomach, thinking about how lucky I am to be able to be trusted enough for that kind of interaction.

Yes, I'm definitely calling again next week. This mare HAS to be mine.

This is getting so exciting! As a side note, I watched a great conformation video on yearling sales etc and one of the things they mentioned was slight conformational defaults and how they can work for you (rather than against) -- slight front paddling was actually one of them!

Rainbow Bridge Tribute

Pax Grows Up!

O-Ren

Pangea

Pax

Dylan

Uma & Lendri

Sriracha

Zazu

Big Frank

About Me

For as long as I can remember, my life has revolved around horses. I've been riding since the age of 7, and doing dressage and eventing since the age of 15. My first gelding was a little black Trakehner named Quincy who had had EPM at some point; he was the best friend an emotional teenager could have ever wanted. He died of a horrible colic in 2004. My second gelding was a dark bay clunker of a Trakehner named Metro; he was the best schoolmaster and friend I ever could have asked for, and he trucked my butt around my first real x-country courses, and brought me my first really fancy ribbons. Due to a whole slew of problems, we euthanized him in 2006. My third horse was the quirky and opinionated Gogo, my first youngster and my first mare. She taught me endless amounts of patience, the importance of praise and soft hands, how to graciously accept mass amounts of blue ribbons one moment and how to graciously accept a dose of humble butt-whooped pie the next. After a long and downhill rehab for compounded leg injuries, we let her go in October of 2011. What's next for me? Follow along and find out!